March 30, 2019

Today the Execution Office delivered a new eviction order to the Sabbagh family in the Kerem Alja’oni section of Sheikh Jarrah, with enforcement of the order possible any time from April 28 – May 8.

Immediate intervention is needed to block the displacement of this 32-member family, at risk of becoming refugees for a second time after first losing homes in Jaffa during the war of 1948.

Despite an apparent recent temporary court freeze, the Execution Office has reactivated eviction proceedings and the Sabbagh family has exhausted all legal channels to stop it. In January 2019, the Supreme Court denied the family the right to present Ottoman era documents that undermine Jewish claims to the land and appear to show that the land purchased by Jewish associations at the end of the 19th century was in fact located in an entirely different area. The Magistrate’s Court and District Court refused to consider the new documents on the basis of statute of limitations, and the Supreme Court ultimately rejected an appeal on the matter.

Please link here to a joint overview from Ir Amim and Peace Now providing historical and legal background on the Sabbagh family case, along with analysis of its broader political ramifications.

If evicted, the Sabbagh family will be the tenth in this section of Sheikh Jarrah to have their home seized by settlers. Roughly thirty Palestinian families are under threat of eviction and at least eleven have open court cases. Those cases were suspended pending the Supreme Court decision; the removal of that stopgap could usher in a wave of new evictions.

Another estimated 35 families are at risk of eviction in Um Haroun, on the west side of Sheik Jarrah, along with some 75 families in Batan al-Hawa, Silwan. These evictions target two of the most strategically located areas in the Old City Basin, now the scene of a rapid uptake in new facts on the ground.

Please address all inquiries to:

Betty Herschman

Director of International Relations & Advocacy

Ir Amim (City of Nations/City of Peoples)

Jerusalem

betty@ir-amim.org.il

054-308-5096

www.ir-amim.org.il

Facebook: www.facebook.com/IrAmimEng

Twitter: @IrAmimAlerts